TheSixthAxis Review: Harry Potter And The Half Blood Prince [PS3]

EA's Harry Potter games have steadily changed from innocent wide-eyed platform games to open-world sandbox adventures, slowly losing much of the game and incorporating more of the film. To fans of the canon, mind, this is most definitely a good thing, and whilst I tremendously enjoyed a couple of the last-gen games it was because I'm a more of a gamer rather than a Potter fan – the recent gen versions have been less about following videogame conventions and more about providing an alternative playthrough of the film's storyline.

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince is the apex of this line of thought: although there's the notion of freedom EA absolutely tunnel you through the main singleplayer mode without ever really letting up. When the game first starts it bombards you with the game's three of four main ideas – collecting, quidditch, duelling and potions – which you wrongly assume to be some kind of quick-fire tutorial. It's not, this is how the game plays out for most of the length of the adventure.